Colours
by Helike
Summary: If he could, he'd choose to be colour-blind, as colours make him remember. Oneshot. Sasuke-centric. Spoilers for chapters 1 - 404.


Somebody explain it to me why I write about this guy again .__.

**Shaitanah,** darling, this one is for you. Happy birthday. It's to show that the hope is not lost yet.

**Warnings:** Not really if you've read Naruto up to chapter 404.  
**Summary:** If he could, he'd choose to be colour-blind, as colours make him remember.

**Disclaimer:** If I owned Naruto, it would be a completely different story.

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**COLOURS**

The world is full of colours.

No matter where Sasuke would glance, he will always see them. They're all around him, catching his eyes and drawing his attention to themselves. Sasuke, however, chooses to ignore them. He pretends he doesn't notice any colours as they make him remember and bring back memories he'd gladly forget.

Green is for Sakura.

Not pink, not red, not white or any other colour she's ever worn. Only green. That's the colour her eyes have. He's seen them flash with anger; he's seen them sparkle with humour. He's seen them narrowed, gleaming with determination, and he's seen them wide open, filled with disbelief.

He's also seen them filled with tears and he still remembers her quiet sobs when she cried over him, thinking that he had died during the mission to the Land of Waves. He remembers the warmth of her body, pressed against his, and the touch of her arms wrapped around him, when she tried to stop him in the Forrest of Death. He also remembers her timid voice asking him not to leave and the offer she made then.

He thought that he could forget all of this; that he could call it all annoying and irritating. However, no matter how much and how often he tries, he can't. Because these whiles were one of these few moments when he did feel that somebody cared about him.

White reminds him about Kakashi.

At first, Sasuke couldn't understand why he decided to associate this particular colour with his former teacher. Later the realization came. After all white is the colour of Kakashi's hair.

Sasuke happens to tell himself that he hates the man. That he hates Kakashi for teaching him that friendship is an important thing. For showing him that Sasuke indeed had one friend around him, even if Sasuke himself didn't realize it at first. For teaching him Chidori which Sasuke later used to pierce his best friend's chest. For trying to stop Sasuke and for not trying hard enough, because maybe if Kakashi had tried harder, Sasuke would not have left.

At the same time, but only when caught off guard, Sasuke happens to think that maybe he should feel grateful as well, as Kakashi made him stronger in some way. _These_ thoughts, however, are quickly dismissed, as no avenger needs them.

Red makes him about his older brother.

Red were the clouds on Itachi's coat.

Sasuke still remembers its dark fabric and long, loose sleeves. Even when Itachi didn't tryto use his illusions on Sasuke, the sleeves still looked like some strange wings, waving slightly, moved by a gentle gusts of a wind.

Red were Itachi's eyes when Sasuke met him after Itachi came back to Konoha.

Sasuke still remembers these eyes – lacking any emotions and somewhat empty, staring at him as if Itachi hadn't really recognized him. Sasuke thought then that he could well have been some stranger to Itachi; someone whom Itachi had never met before. Itachi he met then wasn't the Itachi he remembered.

Red was the blood Itachi had shed.

Strangely enough, it's not the blood that Sasuke thinks about the most often, as in some way he managed to erase that fateful day – the day on which his beloved brother turned himself into Sasuke's worst enemy; the day which was the beginning of the end – from his memory. No, what he really remembers is his brother's face – pale and scratched, with blood slowly dripping from the corner of his mouth – and a smile on it. _That_ smile. The last genuine smile he saw on Itachi's face; the smile which he obviously didn't understand, but which reminded him about the Itachi he had known long years ago. Itachi's "I'm sorry, Sasuke, there won't be next time," still resounds in his ears as if Itachi was standing behind his back, leaning over his shoulder and whispering the words into Sasuke's ear. Itachi's last words. Sasuke doesn't know why he can't forget them.

Blue brings back memories of Naruto.

Naruto's eyes look like little pieces of the sky that for some unknown reason decided to fall down to the earth and turn themselves into a pair of eyes.

Sasuke still remembers that their colour got darker every time Naruto would be angry or upset and he can't even remember how many times he, Sasuke, was the reason of making Naruto feel in this way. The same eyes would light up with enthusiasm every time there would be a challenge awaiting them. The same eyes, but narrowed and tinted with red, glared at him in the Valley of the End. The same eyes, wide open and blue like the sky above him, stared at Sasuke when they met for the first time after Sasuke had left.

An avenger, however, doesn't need such memories and thoughts, so Sasuke tries to forget. He doesn't want to remember how, in the Land of Waves, they both were learning to control chakra. He doesn't want to remember how he saved Naruto from falling down from the tree. He doesn't want to remember that Naruto brought him back to his senses when they met Orochimaru in the Forest of Death. He doesn't want to remember how they tried to discover what Kakashi hid under the mask. He doesn't want to remember anything that happened back then.

Sasuke also wants to forget how he cried in the rain, leaning over unconscious Naruto, and how he went away, leaving behind the only person he called his friend.

The truth is that from all the colours only black is safe.

With black he can connect.

Black is his heart, filled with grief and hatred, but he tries to convince himself that it's okay to feel in this way. Black is the revenge that made him choose the path he follows and there is no day that he doesn't tell himself that he doesn't regret. Black is the cloak he's worn – so similar to the one he remembers seeing on Itachi, with red clouds marking its silky surface. Black are Amaterasu's flames – the last gift given him by Itachi and his ultimate weapon which might bring him darkness in the end.

Black is also his future, filled with revenge, uncertainty and possible blindness. To make it all worse, he does nothing to save himself from any of them; instead he tells himself that he prefers it all to end in this way. The darkness is around him; the darkness is inside of him. It's not something about what he would really care.

However, even the darkness is not complete, as there is no darkness that could not be lit up by even the smallest sparkle.

He knows that there still is one sparkle in _his_ darkness. There is that one little patch of a bright colour – orange mixed with yellow and red – surrounded by black. There is that one inextinguishable flame that won't die down and which always will smoulder, no matter how much Sasuke would like it to disappear. He tries to deny its existence, but no matter what he thinks or says, it still is there – warming him up from the inside and trying to melt the ice which covered his heart.

It's then that Sasuke finally realizes that he made a mistake.

Naruto's colour has never been blue.

Naruto's true colour is the colour of the flame.

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**THE END**


End file.
